Body found along road ID’d as missing Arkansas woman

A body found in Jefferson County on Wednesday is that of a 71-year-old woman who was reported missing last week in Conway, police said Friday.

Police are investigating Elvia Fragstein’s death as a homicide, said Erin Stone, a spokesman for the Faulkner County sheriff’s office.

Fragstein’s husband reported her missing after she didn’t return from a shopping trip July 7, according to a release from the Faulkner County sheriff’s office.

Fragstein’s vehicle, a 2013 silver Honda CRV, was spotted in July 7 surveillance footage from the Conway Commons shopping center. The footage showed Fragstein’s car driving through the parking lot “at a high rate of speed,” and additional video showed the car behind the shopping center.

The vehicle remains missing.

“At that point it looked like it was an abduction case,” Stone said.

Investigators asked Jefferson County authorities Friday morning to see if a body discovered Wednesday in that county might be Fragstein. Officials confirmed the body was Fragstein around 1 p.m., Stone said.

The Jefferson County sheriff’s office received a call Wednesday morning after a driver spotted a woman’s body lying close to an asphalt drive along Gibb Anderson Road. The road is near Pine Bluff, just south of Grider Field Ladd Road.

Maj. Lafayette Woods Jr. of the Jefferson County sheriff’s office said the woman was clothed, but there was no identification on the body. Decomposition precluded officers from releasing any kind of identifying details, Woods said. Officials believed the body had been left for at least a day and a half to two days along the rural road.

Faulkner County authorities said in their release there is reason to believe Fragstein “was forcefully taken from Conway” and killed by individuals believed to be from Jefferson County.